An electrolyte system may use electrodes to remove ions from an electrolyte. The electrolyte may contain positively-charged ions and negatively-charged ions. The electrodes may be charged so that one electrode has a positive charge and another electrode has a negative charge. When the electrodes are charged, the positively-charged ions are sorbed by the negatively-charged electrode, and the negatively-charged ions are sorbed by the positively-charged electrodes. An example electrolyte system is a desalination system, which uses charged electrodes to remove salt (NaCl) from water. When the salt is in the water, the salt may dissolve into positively-charged sodium ions (Na+(aq)) and negatively-charged chloride ions (Cl−(aq)). When the electrodes are charged, the positively-charged sodium ions are sorbed by the negatively-charged electrode, and the negatively-charged chloride ions are sorbed by the positively-charged electrode.